http://www.newyorker.com/contributors/joshua-rothman
Online version of the weekly magazine, with current articles, cartoons, blogs, audio, video, slide shows, an archive of articles and abstracts back to 1925.Fri, 09 Dec 2016 17:04:57 +0000en-UShourly1http://www.newyorker.com/wp-content/assets/img/icon/apple-touch-icon-144x144-precomposed.pnghttp://www.newyorker.com/contributors/joshua-rothman
A Short Film About Hidden Agendas and Flashes of Dangerhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/a-short-film-about-hidden-agendas-and-flashes-of-danger?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3281036 Joshua RothmanTue, 15 Nov 2016 12:00:18 +0000Thought the election was tense? Take a look at our newest Screening Room short, “The Mulberry Bush,” a short film written and directed by Neil LaBute. Two men—a suited-and-tied lonely luncher (Victor Slezak) and a younger, wiry guy in a Carhartt hoodie (J. J. Kandel)—sit down next to each other in Central Park. They get to talking about sports and the weather, then begin sharing details about their families. You might think that these strangers are unusually talkative. You might notice the presence of what the youngsters call “side-eye.” You may suspect that one of the men isn’t really talking about the weather—he’s “talking about the weather.” He has a hidden agenda. There’s something he wants to say or do: his body is saturated with barely restrained energy. Let’s just say that “The Mulberry Bush” isn’t a film about two guys in a park. It’s about pain, guilt, and how we respond to the threat of danger.]]>Thought the election was tense? Take a look at our newest Screening Room short, “The Mulberry Bush,” a short film written and directed by Neil LaBute. Two men—a suited-and-tied lonely luncher (Victor Slezak) and a younger, wiry guy in a Carhartt hoodie (J. J. Kandel)—sit down next to each other in Central Park. They get to talking about sports and the weather, then begin sharing details about their families. You might think that these strangers are unusually talkative. You might notice the presence of what the youngsters call “side-eye.” You may suspect that one of the men isn’t really talking about the weather—he’s “talking about the weather.” He has a hidden agenda. There’s something he wants to say or do: his body is saturated with barely restrained energy. Let’s just say that “The Mulberry Bush” isn’t a film about two guys in a park. It’s about pain, guilt, and how we respond to the threat of danger.

Related:An Immersive Play That Transports You to a Chicago Public High SchoolA Lost “Glass Menagerie,” RediscoveredMaryann Plunkett Is a Radiant Everywoman]]>How to Restore Your Faith in Democracyhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/how-to-restore-your-faith-in-democracy?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3279757 Joshua RothmanFri, 11 Nov 2016 16:09:29 +0000Two weeks ago—when the election of Donald Trump was still, to many people, an almost comedic idea—Charles Taylor, the Canadian philosopher, visited the Social Science Research Council, in Brooklyn, to talk about the fate of democracy with some graduate students. He had just won the Berggruen Prize, which is awarded, along with a million dollars, to a philosopher “whose ideas are intellectually profound but also able to inform practical and public life.” Taylor’s books tell the story of how some sources of value (love, art, individuality) have grown in relevance, while others (God, king, tradition) have declined. When we met, Taylor’s newest work was a lecture called “Some Crises of Democracy.” Citizens in Western democracies, he argued, used to find personal fulfillment in political participation; now, they were coming to feel that the democratic process was a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing, and that democratic politicians were con artists. Their desperation and cynicism seemed capable of turning these beliefs into self-fulfilling prophecies.]]>Two weeks ago—when the election of Donald Trump was still, to many people, an almost comedic idea—Charles Taylor, the Canadian philosopher, visited the Social Science Research Council, in Brooklyn, to talk about the fate of democracy with some graduate students. He had just won the Berggruen Prize, which is awarded, along with a million dollars, to a philosopher “whose ideas are intellectually profound but also able to inform practical and public life.” Taylor’s books tell the story of how some sources of value (love, art, individuality) have grown in relevance, while others (God, king, tradition) have declined. When we met, Taylor’s newest work was a lecture called “Some Crises of Democracy.” Citizens in Western democracies, he argued, used to find personal fulfillment in political participation; now, they were coming to feel that the democratic process was a lot of sound and fury, signifying nothing, and that democratic politicians were con artists. Their desperation and cynicism seemed capable of turning these beliefs into self-fulfilling prophecies.

Related:Japan’s Pivot from Obama to TrumpThe Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasTrump, the Man in the Crowd]]>Red Neighbor, Blue Neighborhttp://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/11/07/red-neighbor-blue-neighbor?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3271106 Joshua RothmanMon, 31 Oct 2016 04:00:00 +0000BooksEarlier this year, the small Long Island town where I live—a seaside village of a few thousand people—held its municipal election. The choice was between a party that favored development and another that opposed it, and the lead-up to the vote was tense. Leaflets flooded mailboxes. Signs, bigger each week, sprouted on lawns. On Facebook, voters insulted the candidates and one another with frank exuberance; around dinner tables, talk was of the irreparable damage one party or the other would inflict on village life. “It really is a shame that every four years the Village has to deal with the smut and name calling that has seemingly become a tradition,” one party spokesperson lamented on Facebook. Perhaps, the spokesperson continued, this was symptomatic of a broader condition: elections across the country appeared to have “degenerated” and become “hate filled.”]]>Earlier this year, the small Long Island town where I live—a seaside village of a few thousand people—held its municipal election. The choice was between a party that favored development and another that opposed it, and the lead-up to the vote was tense. Leaflets flooded mailboxes. Signs, bigger each week, sprouted on lawns. On Facebook, voters insulted the candidates and one another with frank exuberance; around dinner tables, talk was of the irreparable damage one party or the other would inflict on village life. “It really is a shame that every four years the Village has to deal with the smut and name calling that has seemingly become a tradition,” one party spokesperson lamented on Facebook. Perhaps, the spokesperson continued, this was symptomatic of a broader condition: elections across the country appeared to have “degenerated” and become “hate filled.”

Related:The Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasMaryann Plunkett Is a Radiant EverywomanItaly Approaches Its Own Choice Between Liberalism and Populism]]>The Lives of Poor White Peoplehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-lives-of-poor-white-people?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3251379 Joshua RothmanMon, 12 Sep 2016 04:00:39 +0000“I grew up poor, in the Rust Belt, in an Ohio steel town that has been hemorrhaging jobs and hope for as long as I can remember.” That’s how J. D. Vance begins one of this campaign season’s saddest and most fascinating books, “Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis” (Harper). Vance was born in Kentucky and raised by his grandparents, as a self-described “hillbilly,” in Middletown, Ohio, home of the once-mighty Armco Steel. His family struggled with poverty and domestic violence, of which he was a victim. His mother was addicted to drugs—first to painkillers, then to heroin. Many of his neighbors were jobless and on welfare. Vance escaped their fate by joining the Marines and serving in Iraq. Afterward, he attended Ohio State and Yale Law School, where he was mentored by Amy Chua, the law professor and tiger mom. He now lives in San Francisco, where he works at Mithril Capital Management, the investment firm helmed by Peter Thiel. It seems safe to say that Vance, who is now in his early thirties, has seen a wider swath of America than most people.]]>“I grew up poor, in the Rust Belt, in an Ohio steel town that has been hemorrhaging jobs and hope for as long as I can remember.” That’s how J. D. Vance begins one of this campaign season’s saddest and most fascinating books, “Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis” (Harper). Vance was born in Kentucky and raised by his grandparents, as a self-described “hillbilly,” in Middletown, Ohio, home of the once-mighty Armco Steel. His family struggled with poverty and domestic violence, of which he was a victim. His mother was addicted to drugs—first to painkillers, then to heroin. Many of his neighbors were jobless and on welfare. Vance escaped their fate by joining the Marines and serving in Iraq. Afterward, he attended Ohio State and Yale Law School, where he was mentored by Amy Chua, the law professor and tiger mom. He now lives in San Francisco, where he works at Mithril Capital Management, the investment firm helmed by Peter Thiel. It seems safe to say that Vance, who is now in his early thirties, has seen a wider swath of America than most people.

Related:Japan’s Pivot from Obama to TrumpTrump, the Man in the CrowdHow Much of the Obama Doctrine Will Survive Trump?]]>Werner Herzog’s Internet Visionarieshttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/werner-herzogs-internet-visionaries?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3247747 Joshua RothmanThu, 01 Sep 2016 17:51:11 +0000Werner Herzog’s films have a common theme: they’re about visionaries and dreamers. Sometimes his dreamers accomplish the impossible: he’s made two films, for example—“Little Dieter Needs to Fly” and “Rescue Dawn”—about the American pilot Dieter Dengler, who escaped from a Laotian P.O.W. camp and, for twenty-three days, hiked barefoot through the jungle until he reached freedom. But Herzog is also fascinated by delusional dreamers. At the end of his 1972 film “Aguirre, the Wrath of God,” the conquistador Aguirre stands on a raft in the Amazon. He’s been searching, fruitlessly, for El Dorado; now all his men are dead, and he’s speaking only to their corpses and some monkeys. Still, he shares with them the following vision:]]>Werner Herzog’s films have a common theme: they’re about visionaries and dreamers. Sometimes his dreamers accomplish the impossible: he’s made two films, for example—“Little Dieter Needs to Fly” and “Rescue Dawn”—about the American pilot Dieter Dengler, who escaped from a Laotian P.O.W. camp and, for twenty-three days, hiked barefoot through the jungle until he reached freedom. But Herzog is also fascinated by delusional dreamers. At the end of his 1972 film “Aguirre, the Wrath of God,” the conquistador Aguirre stands on a raft in the Amazon. He’s been searching, fruitlessly, for El Dorado; now all his men are dead, and he’s speaking only to their corpses and some monkeys. Still, he shares with them the following vision:

Related:The Fate of Cinephilia in the Age of StreamingFour Cool Laptop Cords for Writers to Wear Safely to BedTrump Preparedness: Digital Security 101]]>The Old, American Horror Behind “Stranger Things”http://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-infinite-nostalgia-of-stranger-things?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3240427 Joshua RothmanWed, 17 Aug 2016 18:51:29 +0000Last month brought sad news in the ongoing story of the passage of time: Funai, a Japanese electronics firm, announced the shutdown of the world’s only remaining VCR production line. For those of us on the threshold of middle age, this was a cruel blow. The VCR was our smartphone; it gave rhythm and texture to our childhoods. Luckily, we’ve received a compensatory gift: “Stranger Things,” the new sci-fi series on Netflix (which my colleague Emily Nussbaum has reviewed, enthusiastically, in this week’s magazine). The show is a love letter to the VCR era—a satisfying mash-up of all the scary and speculative movies you loved when you were twelve. You watched them over and over again, on VHS. Now you can stream them to your laptop in condensed, purified form.]]>Last month brought sad news in the ongoing story of the passage of time: Funai, a Japanese electronics firm, announced the shutdown of the world’s only remaining VCR production line. For those of us on the threshold of middle age, this was a cruel blow. The VCR was our smartphone; it gave rhythm and texture to our childhoods. Luckily, we’ve received a compensatory gift: “Stranger Things,” the new sci-fi series on Netflix (which my colleague Emily Nussbaum has reviewed, enthusiastically, in this week’s magazine). The show is a love letter to the VCR era—a satisfying mash-up of all the scary and speculative movies you loved when you were twelve. You watched them over and over again, on VHS. Now you can stream them to your laptop in condensed, purified form.

Related:Morning Cartoon: Thursday, September 29thWhat’s Missing from “The Martian”Croissants with Cthulhu]]>The Magic of Olympic Track Cyclinghttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-magic-of-olympic-track-cycling?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3241442 Joshua RothmanTue, 16 Aug 2016 16:04:15 +0000I was twenty when I learned to ride a bike. I’d owned one when I was six—a little yellow number with training wheels, a gift from a boyfriend of my mother’s. Unfortunately, someone stole it, and, for whatever reason, I never got another. For fourteen years, I walked. It wasn’t until 2001, when I was a junior in college and at loose ends for the summer, that I decided to join the rest of humanity behind the handlebars.]]>I was twenty when I learned to ride a bike. I’d owned one when I was six—a little yellow number with training wheels, a gift from a boyfriend of my mother’s. Unfortunately, someone stole it, and, for whatever reason, I never got another. For fourteen years, I walked. It wasn’t until 2001, when I was a junior in college and at loose ends for the summer, that I decided to join the rest of humanity behind the handlebars.

Related:Ryan Lochte and the Impatience of Corporate SponsorsAmerica’s Overperforming Olympic MarathonersHow to Save Olympic Track for Its Fans]]>Screening Room: “Bacon & God’s Wrath”http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/screening-room-bacon-gods-wrath?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3216159 Joshua RothmanTue, 14 Jun 2016 19:37:38 +0000Razie, the subject of Sol Friedman’s documentary “Bacon & God’s Wrath,” is a Jewish woman who’s about to turn ninety. She has also recently become an atheist and is about to try bacon for the first time. From that simple setup, surprises flow. Lying on a couch, like one of Freud’s analysands, Razie tells us about her strictly religious upbringing, which seems to have brought her little joy. As she describes how using the Internet led her to atheism (“Some of my most intimate thoughts and questions . . . were so common that the Google could anticipate it!”), a picture of her wry, inquisitive, unsentimental mind emerges. Something is at stake in her decision to try bacon: it’s a way of marking a transformation—of asserting that, even late in life, it’s possible to change. It’s also, one senses, a way of claiming independence from the fear of death that can haunt old age.]]>Razie, the subject of Sol Friedman’s documentary “Bacon & God’s Wrath,” is a Jewish woman who’s about to turn ninety. She has also recently become an atheist and is about to try bacon for the first time. From that simple setup, surprises flow. Lying on a couch, like one of Freud’s analysands, Razie tells us about her strictly religious upbringing, which seems to have brought her little joy. As she describes how using the Internet led her to atheism (“Some of my most intimate thoughts and questions . . . were so common that the Google could anticipate it!”), a picture of her wry, inquisitive, unsentimental mind emerges. Something is at stake in her decision to try bacon: it’s a way of marking a transformation—of asserting that, even late in life, it’s possible to change. It’s also, one senses, a way of claiming independence from the fear of death that can haunt old age.

Related:A Short Film About Hidden Agendas and Flashes of DangerAn Oscar-Winning Short Film About Stuttering and LoveThe Screening Room: “Russian Roulette”]]>What Are the Odds We Are Living in a Computer Simulation?http://www.newyorker.com/books/joshua-rothman/what-are-the-odds-we-are-living-in-a-computer-simulation?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3214027 Joshua RothmanThu, 09 Jun 2016 20:00:14 +0000Last week, Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla Motors, SpaceX, and other cutting-edge companies, took a surprising question at the Code Conference, a technology event in California. What, a man in the audience asked, did Musk make of the idea that we are living not in the real world, but in an elaborate computer simulation? Musk exhibited a surprising familiarity with this concept. “I’ve had so many simulation discussions it’s crazy,” Musk said. Citing the speed with which video games are improving, he suggested that the development of simulations “indistinguishable from reality” was inevitable. The likelihood that we are living in “base reality,” he concluded, was just “one in billions.”]]>Last week, Elon Musk, the billionaire founder of Tesla Motors, SpaceX, and other cutting-edge companies, took a surprising question at the Code Conference, a technology event in California. What, a man in the audience asked, did Musk make of the idea that we are living not in the real world, but in an elaborate computer simulation? Musk exhibited a surprising familiarity with this concept. “I’ve had so many simulation discussions it’s crazy,” Musk said. Citing the speed with which video games are improving, he suggested that the development of simulations “indistinguishable from reality” was inevitable. The likelihood that we are living in “base reality,” he concluded, was just “one in billions.”

Related:The Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasThe Fate of Cinephilia in the Age of StreamingFour Cool Laptop Cords for Writers to Wear Safely to Bed]]>The Metamorphosishttp://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/05/30/goatman-and-being-a-beast?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3204779 Joshua RothmanMon, 23 May 2016 04:00:00 +0000BooksThomas Thwaites first considered becoming an animal on a spring day in 2013. He was walking Noggin, his nieces’ Irish terrier, along the Thames when he found himself taking stock of his life. Thwaites was then thirty-three. A few years earlier, he’d launched his career as an artist and designer with a clever project: constructing a toaster from scratch, mining the iron and making the plastic himself. Along the way, he catalogued the environmental devastation caused by humanity’s determination to toast en masse—a vast crime against nature committed in the name of breakfast. Thwaites’s toaster was acquired by the Victoria & Albert Museum for its permanent collection. Although the toaster never actually made toast—a few crucial components proved too difficult to build—it was, in all other respects, a success.]]>Thomas Thwaites first considered becoming an animal on a spring day in 2013. He was walking Noggin, his nieces’ Irish terrier, along the Thames when he found himself taking stock of his life. Thwaites was then thirty-three. A few years earlier, he’d launched his career as an artist and designer with a clever project: constructing a toaster from scratch, mining the iron and making the plastic himself. Along the way, he catalogued the environmental devastation caused by humanity’s determination to toast en masse—a vast crime against nature committed in the name of breakfast. Thwaites’s toaster was acquired by the Victoria & Albert Museum for its permanent collection. Although the toaster never actually made toast—a few crucial components proved too difficult to build—it was, in all other respects, a success.

Related:Coyotes, the Ultimate American TrickstersSimen Johan’s Wildlife IllusionsBeastie Boys and Girls: The New Anthropomorphism]]>What Was “The Good Wife” Really About?http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/what-was-the-good-wife-really-about?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3205141 Joshua RothmanThu, 19 May 2016 16:30:57 +0000“What do such large, loose, baggy monsters, with their queer elements of the accidental and the arbitrary, artistically mean?” Henry James asked, in a 1921 essay about very long novels. A vast book like “War and Peace,” he wrote, was indisputably full of life; the problem was coherence. A writer could paint on “too ample a canvas” and find “pictorial fusion” elusive. The resulting story could be exciting and resonant, and yet of “no more use for expressing a main intention than a wheel without a hub is of use for moving a cart.”]]>“What do such large, loose, baggy monsters, with their queer elements of the accidental and the arbitrary, artistically mean?” Henry James asked, in a 1921 essay about very long novels. A vast book like “War and Peace,” he wrote, was indisputably full of life; the problem was coherence. A writer could paint on “too ample a canvas” and find “pictorial fusion” elusive. The resulting story could be exciting and resonant, and yet of “no more use for expressing a main intention than a wheel without a hub is of use for moving a cart.”

Related:Martha Stewart, Comedy Genius?“Better Things,” Pamela Adlon’s Unlikely Ode to Single MotherhoodUpdated Football-Announcer Clichés]]>The Politics of Bathroomshttp://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-politics-of-bathrooms?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3202372 Joshua RothmanSat, 14 May 2016 16:00:42 +0000On Monday, Loretta Lynch, the U.S. Attorney General, and Pat McCrory, the governor of North Carolina, announced that they would be suing each another over the Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, a new law requiring that North Carolinians use only the public bathrooms that correspond to the “biological sex” listed on their birth certificates. In Texas, a parallel conflict began brewing between the retailer Target, which has announced an open-bathroom policy for transgender employees, and the state’s attorney general, Ken Paxton. (Paxton has demanded, in a letter to Target’s C.E.O., that the company provide the full text of its “safety policies regarding the protection of women and children from those who would use the cover of Target’s restroom policy for nefarious purposes.”) And in Chicago, a legal battle is being waged over which high-school locker room a transgender student ought to use. Yesterday, the Obama Administration issued a directive telling all public schools to allow students to use bathrooms or locker rooms matching their gender identities. Across the country, in other words, controversy is following transgender people who step into sex-segregated spaces.]]>On Monday, Loretta Lynch, the U.S. Attorney General, and Pat McCrory, the governor of North Carolina, announced that they would be suing each another over the Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act, a new law requiring that North Carolinians use only the public bathrooms that correspond to the “biological sex” listed on their birth certificates. In Texas, a parallel conflict began brewing between the retailer Target, which has announced an open-bathroom policy for transgender employees, and the state’s attorney general, Ken Paxton. (Paxton has demanded, in a letter to Target’s C.E.O., that the company provide the full text of its “safety policies regarding the protection of women and children from those who would use the cover of Target’s restroom policy for nefarious purposes.”) And in Chicago, a legal battle is being waged over which high-school locker room a transgender student ought to use. Yesterday, the Obama Administration issued a directive telling all public schools to allow students to use bathrooms or locker rooms matching their gender identities. Across the country, in other words, controversy is following transgender people who step into sex-segregated spaces.

Related:Gavin Grimm’s Transgender-Rights Case and the Problem with Informal Executive ActionThe Trump Campaign in North CarolinaA Critical Week in North Carolina]]>Shakespeare in The New Yorkerhttp://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/shakespeare-in-the-new-yorker?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3194460 Joshua RothmanSat, 23 Apr 2016 04:00:13 +0000Shakespeare’s influence is so vast that it’s hard to choose a selection of New Yorker pieces about him—he comes up everywhere! Still, in honor of the four-hundredth anniversary of his death, this Saturday, we’ve assembled the reading list below. You’ll find pieces about actors, scholars, filmmakers, set designers, and, of course, about the plays themselves—the Shakespearean kaleidoscope seen through a New Yorker lens.]]>Shakespeare’s influence is so vast that it’s hard to choose a selection of New Yorker pieces about him—he comes up everywhere! Still, in honor of the four-hundredth anniversary of his death, this Saturday, we’ve assembled the reading list below. You’ll find pieces about actors, scholars, filmmakers, set designers, and, of course, about the plays themselves—the Shakespearean kaleidoscope seen through a New Yorker lens.

Related:History’s Great Authors Request NudesTwo Ways to Bring Shakespeare Into the Twenty-First CenturyThe Bard of Eastern Ukraine, Where Things Are Falling Apart]]>Knausgaard’s Selflessnesshttp://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/knausgaards-selflessness?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3193130 Joshua RothmanWed, 20 Apr 2016 20:45:02 +0000Five volumes in, there’s still a temptation to redeem Karl Ove Knausgaard from egotism—to find, in his multi-volume autobiographical novel “My Struggle,” some subject other than Karl Ove’s life, some theme profound enough to justify these thousands of pages. Earlier this month, in an essay on the fifth volume in The New Republic, Ryu Spaeth argued that “My Struggle” is “actually a commentary on contemporary life in the West, a sweeping novel of ideas in the tradition of Thomas Mann and Fyodor Dostoevsky.” Other critics have likened Knausgaard to Proust, whose novel wasn’t just a life story but a philosophical meditation on aesthetics, time, and selfhood. The final volume, it’s thought, will reveal the novel’s grand intellectual design.]]>Five volumes in, there’s still a temptation to redeem Karl Ove Knausgaard from egotism—to find, in his multi-volume autobiographical novel “My Struggle,” some subject other than Karl Ove’s life, some theme profound enough to justify these thousands of pages. Earlier this month, in an essay on the fifth volume in The New Republic, Ryu Spaeth argued that “My Struggle” is “actually a commentary on contemporary life in the West, a sweeping novel of ideas in the tradition of Thomas Mann and Fyodor Dostoevsky.” Other critics have likened Knausgaard to Proust, whose novel wasn’t just a life story but a philosophical meditation on aesthetics, time, and selfhood. The final volume, it’s thought, will reveal the novel’s grand intellectual design.

Related:Listen to FrøkedalMercy for a Terrorist in NorwayTwo Novels About Frustrated White Men, Thirty-five Years Apart]]>When Men Wanted to Be Virilehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/when-men-wanted-to-be-virile?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3190377 Joshua RothmanThu, 14 Apr 2016 14:00:11 +0000For the past few weeks, I’ve had a book on my desk called “A History of Virility.” It’s a seven-hundred-page scholarly anthology, published by Columbia University Press and translated from the French by Keith Cohen, chronicling how Western masculinity has been transformed, successively, by Ancient Greece and Rome, encounters with barbarians, the medieval court, the Enlightenment, colonialism, the Industrial Revolution, the invention of childhood, mechanized warfare, Fascism, the labor movement, feminism, gay liberation, and so on. The book is the size of a telephone directory; its cover features a glowering, Brando-like Adonis in a tank top. It is, in short, a source of amusement to all who pass by, many of whom point to the word “virility” and say, “Ew.”]]>For the past few weeks, I’ve had a book on my desk called “A History of Virility.” It’s a seven-hundred-page scholarly anthology, published by Columbia University Press and translated from the French by Keith Cohen, chronicling how Western masculinity has been transformed, successively, by Ancient Greece and Rome, encounters with barbarians, the medieval court, the Enlightenment, colonialism, the Industrial Revolution, the invention of childhood, mechanized warfare, Fascism, the labor movement, feminism, gay liberation, and so on. The book is the size of a telephone directory; its cover features a glowering, Brando-like Adonis in a tank top. It is, in short, a source of amusement to all who pass by, many of whom point to the word “virility” and say, “Ew.”

Related:The Alt-Right Hails Its Victorious God-EmperorThe Dehumanizing Sexism of the Harvard Men’s Soccer Team’s “Scouting Report”Samantha Bee, America’s New Comedian-in-Chief]]>Screening Room: “Boogaloo and Graham”http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/screening-room-boogaloo-and-graham?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3190095 Joshua RothmanTue, 12 Apr 2016 21:45:40 +0000“Boogaloo and Graham,” by the Northern Irish director Michael Lennox, is a delightful and funny short film that contains, as a kind of hidden surprise, a meditation on fear. The movie, which was nominated for an Academy Award this year, follows a family—two boys (Riley Hamilton and Aaron Lynch) and their father and mother (Martin McCann and Charlene McKenna)—during a few months in Belfast during the Troubles. It’s the summer of 1978. Outside the family’s apartment, armed patrols prowl the streets. Inside, the father unboxes his sons’ new pets: two baby chicks, whom the boys name Boogaloo and Graham.]]>“Boogaloo and Graham,” by the Northern Irish director Michael Lennox, is a delightful and funny short film that contains, as a kind of hidden surprise, a meditation on fear. The movie, which was nominated for an Academy Award this year, follows a family—two boys (Riley Hamilton and Aaron Lynch) and their father and mother (Martin McCann and Charlene McKenna)—during a few months in Belfast during the Troubles. It’s the summer of 1978. Outside the family’s apartment, armed patrols prowl the streets. Inside, the father unboxes his sons’ new pets: two baby chicks, whom the boys name Boogaloo and Graham.

Related:Out Loud: Northern Ireland’s Tenuous PeaceGerry Adams and Hillary Clinton in New YorkLife in Divis Flats]]>Apple at Forty: Steve Jobs Led Us to the Fourth Dimensionhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/apple-at-forty-steve-jobs-led-us-to-the-fourth-dimension?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3185523 Joshua RothmanFri, 01 Apr 2016 22:49:05 +0000When I realized that Apple would be turning forty this week—the company was founded on April 1, 1976—I suddenly felt old. I’m thirty-six, a few years younger than Apple, but I’ve followed the company my whole life, and, on some level, I’ve associated its progress with my own. During Apple’s education-centered early days, I was a kid in school; my adolescence coincided with its awkward, post-Jobs meltdown, when it seemed not to know itself; and I came into my own as an adult during its more focussed, mature, and minimalist renaissance. Apple and I are now entering middle age; I suspect we’re both wondering how to stay young.]]>When I realized that Apple would be turning forty this week—the company was founded on April 1, 1976—I suddenly felt old. I’m thirty-six, a few years younger than Apple, but I’ve followed the company my whole life, and, on some level, I’ve associated its progress with my own. During Apple’s education-centered early days, I was a kid in school; my adolescence coincided with its awkward, post-Jobs meltdown, when it seemed not to know itself; and I came into my own as an adult during its more focussed, mature, and minimalist renaissance. Apple and I are now entering middle age; I suspect we’re both wondering how to stay young.

Related:The Fate of Cinephilia in the Age of StreamingFour Cool Laptop Cords for Writers to Wear Safely to BedTrump Preparedness: Digital Security 101]]>The Cruel Irony of “The Americans”http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-cruel-irony-of-the-americans?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3179486 Joshua RothmanWed, 16 Mar 2016 23:36:51 +0000When Karl Marx wrote that history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce, he couldn’t have known that a television show would find a way to take those two versions of history and combine them. But over the course of three seasons—the fourth premières this week, on FX—“The Americans” has become one of the most multilayered dramas on TV; nothing else can match its combination of genuine sadness and muted, mordant hilarity. Watching it, you feel both dread and delight—a bitter kind of happiness. It’s the whiskey sour of television shows.]]>When Karl Marx wrote that history repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce, he couldn’t have known that a television show would find a way to take those two versions of history and combine them. But over the course of three seasons—the fourth premières this week, on FX—“The Americans” has become one of the most multilayered dramas on TV; nothing else can match its combination of genuine sadness and muted, mordant hilarity. Watching it, you feel both dread and delight—a bitter kind of happiness. It’s the whiskey sour of television shows.

Related:Postscript: Fidel Castro, 1926-2016Putin, Syria, and Why Moscow Has Gone War-CrazyThe Real Nuclear Threat]]>Shut Up and Sit Downhttp://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/02/29/our-dangerous-leadership-obsession?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3168212 Joshua RothmanMon, 22 Feb 2016 04:00:00 +0000A Critic at LargeThe Titanic sank on April 15, 1912. Nine days later, Thomas Hardy composed a poem about the disaster called “The Convergence of the Twain.” Many poets were mourning the dead; Hardy took a different approach. He asked readers to contemplate the accident’s prehistory: to imagine how, even as the great ship was being built, the iceberg—its “sinister mate”—had also been growing. “No mortal eye could see / The intimate welding of their later history,” Hardy wrote. But, even so, “They were bent / By paths coincident / On being anon twin halves of one august event.”]]>The Titanic sank on April 15, 1912. Nine days later, Thomas Hardy composed a poem about the disaster called “The Convergence of the Twain.” Many poets were mourning the dead; Hardy took a different approach. He asked readers to contemplate the accident’s prehistory: to imagine how, even as the great ship was being built, the iceberg—its “sinister mate”—had also been growing. “No mortal eye could see / The intimate welding of their later history,” Hardy wrote. But, even so, “They were bent / By paths coincident / On being anon twin halves of one august event.”

Related:Japan’s Pivot from Obama to TrumpTrump, the Man in the CrowdHow Much of the Obama Doctrine Will Survive Trump?]]>Harper Lee: A Reading Listhttp://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/harper-lee-a-reading-list?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3169117 Joshua RothmanFri, 19 Feb 2016 17:56:26 +0000This morning, word came that Harper Lee, the author of “To Kill a Mockingbird,” had died, at the age of eighty-nine. Lee was one of the most important and one of the most mysterious figures in American literary history. “To Kill a Mockingbird,” which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1960, became, for many readers, one of the key novels about race in America. (The film version, starring Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch, is an equally immovable cultural touchstone.) And yet, despite her success, Lee lived in relative seclusion, in her home town of Monroeville, Alabama. She didn’t publish another novel until last year, when “Go Set a Watchman,” a prequel to “Mockingbird,” appeared. In a review of that novel, Adam Gopnik considered the “extraordinary hold” that “Mockingbird” has on our collective imagination. It wasn’t just that the book treated race in an unusually incisive way, he wrote; readers treasured it for “the intensity of [its] evocation of coming of age, and of the feel of streets and summers at that moment. Harper Lee did for Maycomb (her poeticized version of her home town, Monroeville, Alabama) what J. D. Salinger did for Central Park—made it a permanent amphitheatre of American adolescence.”]]>This morning, word came that Harper Lee, the author of “To Kill a Mockingbird,” had died, at the age of eighty-nine. Lee was one of the most important and one of the most mysterious figures in American literary history. “To Kill a Mockingbird,” which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1960, became, for many readers, one of the key novels about race in America. (The film version, starring Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch, is an equally immovable cultural touchstone.) And yet, despite her success, Lee lived in relative seclusion, in her home town of Monroeville, Alabama. She didn’t publish another novel until last year, when “Go Set a Watchman,” a prequel to “Mockingbird,” appeared. In a review of that novel, Adam Gopnik considered the “extraordinary hold” that “Mockingbird” has on our collective imagination. It wasn’t just that the book treated race in an unusually incisive way, he wrote; readers treasured it for “the intensity of [its] evocation of coming of age, and of the feel of streets and summers at that moment. Harper Lee did for Maycomb (her poeticized version of her home town, Monroeville, Alabama) what J. D. Salinger did for Central Park—made it a permanent amphitheatre of American adolescence.”

Related:What Two Forgotten Pieces Tell Us About Harper LeePostscript: Harper Lee, 1926-2016Kacey Musgraves, Harper Lee, and the Home-Town Dilemma]]>The Screening Room: “We Can’t Live Without Cosmos”http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-screening-room-we-cant-live-without-cosmos?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3164556 Joshua RothmanTue, 09 Feb 2016 18:03:03 +0000There’s joy in every squiggle of Konstantin Bronzit’s “We Can’t Live Without Cosmos.” The fifteen-minute film, which is nominated for a 2016 Oscar in the animated-short category, follows two unnamed cosmonauts as they prepare for a space mission. They’re best friends who revolve in the same centrifuge, swim in neighboring lanes, and read together at night. Their happiness and exuberance is infectious. It lifts the stone-faced scientists who track their progress; it even expresses itself in their space suits, which are winsomely shaped to accommodate their slightly different heads (one is square, the other rectangular). Even as they prepare for their high-tech journey, they embody old-fashioned, noble virtues: bravery, curiosity, strength, tenderness.]]>There’s joy in every squiggle of Konstantin Bronzit’s “We Can’t Live Without Cosmos.” The fifteen-minute film, which is nominated for a 2016 Oscar in the animated-short category, follows two unnamed cosmonauts as they prepare for a space mission. They’re best friends who revolve in the same centrifuge, swim in neighboring lanes, and read together at night. Their happiness and exuberance is infectious. It lifts the stone-faced scientists who track their progress; it even expresses itself in their space suits, which are winsomely shaped to accommodate their slightly different heads (one is square, the other rectangular). Even as they prepare for their high-tech journey, they embody old-fashioned, noble virtues: bravery, curiosity, strength, tenderness.

Related:“Whatever Happened to Interracial Love?”: Kathleen Collins’s Revelatory Short StoriesA Self-Bundling Service for CinephilesA Portrait of My Ego as a Big Black Dog]]>The Nostalgic Science Fiction of “The X-Files”http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-nostalgia-science-fiction-of-the-x-files?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3159359 Joshua RothmanSat, 23 Jan 2016 16:50:52 +0000I have a vivid memory of the premiere of “The X-Files.” It was September, 1993, and I was thirteen years old. That summer, I’d discovered horror movies and watched “The Thing” and “The Silence of the Lambs”; I’d also read “Communion,” Whitley Strieber’s best-selling memoir about being abducted by aliens. Like a lot of people back then, I was fascinated by U.F.O.s—in the late eighties and early nineties, alien abduction was a thing. Whole episodes of “The Sally Jesse Raphael Show” and “The Maury Povich Show” were dedicated to it. I couldn’t wait for “The X-Files.” I was so certain that the series would be great that, when the pilot aired, I taped it (a rarer, more labor-intensive undertaking in those pre-DVR days).]]>I have a vivid memory of the premiere of “The X-Files.” It was September, 1993, and I was thirteen years old. That summer, I’d discovered horror movies and watched “The Thing” and “The Silence of the Lambs”; I’d also read “Communion,” Whitley Strieber’s best-selling memoir about being abducted by aliens. Like a lot of people back then, I was fascinated by U.F.O.s—in the late eighties and early nineties, alien abduction was a thing. Whole episodes of “The Sally Jesse Raphael Show” and “The Maury Povich Show” were dedicated to it. I couldn’t wait for “The X-Files.” I was so certain that the series would be great that, when the pilot aired, I taped it (a rarer, more labor-intensive undertaking in those pre-DVR days).

Related:Round Two!Rate CultureWilliam Gibson’s Man-Made Future]]>O. J. Simpson in The New Yorkerhttp://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/o-j-simpson-in-the-new-yorker?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3156014 Joshua RothmanTue, 19 Jan 2016 19:30:12 +0000The O. J. Simpson trial ended more than twenty years ago, on October 3, 1995. What should we make of the amount of time that’s passed? In some ways, the trial seems to belong to a long-ago period—an era when many white Americans could be surprised by the gulf separating black and white attitudes toward the police. In other ways, it could have happened yesterday. The problems that it placed at the center of the national conversation—the relationship between race and law enforcement, the prevalence of domestic violence—are still at its center. And the trial has also come to occupy a strange, unsettled place in the world of pop culture. Can you still watch “The Naked Gun”? What, if anything, should you think about the fact that O. J. Simpson is Kim Kardashian’s godfather (he was there, in the hospital, when she was born)? This February, a new TV series, “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story,” will be turning the Simpson trial into a true-crime drama. The series, which is based on “The Run of His Life,” a book by the New Yorker staff writer Jeffrey Toobin, who covered the trial and its aftermath for the magazine, looks to be a nineties-nostalgia trip—present-day political relevance excepted.]]>The O. J. Simpson trial ended more than twenty years ago, on October 3, 1995. What should we make of the amount of time that’s passed? In some ways, the trial seems to belong to a long-ago period—an era when many white Americans could be surprised by the gulf separating black and white attitudes toward the police. In other ways, it could have happened yesterday. The problems that it placed at the center of the national conversation—the relationship between race and law enforcement, the prevalence of domestic violence—are still at its center. And the trial has also come to occupy a strange, unsettled place in the world of pop culture. Can you still watch “The Naked Gun”? What, if anything, should you think about the fact that O. J. Simpson is Kim Kardashian’s godfather (he was there, in the hospital, when she was born)? This February, a new TV series, “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story,” will be turning the Simpson trial into a true-crime drama. The series, which is based on “The Run of His Life,” a book by the New Yorker staff writer Jeffrey Toobin, who covered the trial and its aftermath for the magazine, looks to be a nineties-nostalgia trip—present-day political relevance excepted.

Related:What a Knife Can Tell Us About the O. J. Simpson Case]]>Lois Weisberg (1925–2016)http://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/lois-weisberg-1925-2016?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3156037 Joshua RothmanThu, 14 Jan 2016 23:45:14 +0000Lois Weisberg died yesterday, at the age of ninety. According to the Chicago Reader, Weisberg, who worked for decades as the head of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs, was “the former linchpin of nearly everything that’s cultural about Chicago.” She was also one of Malcolm Gladwell’s most memorable Profile subjects. In 1999, Gladwell wrote a piece about her called “Six Degrees of Lois Weisberg,” in which he argued that Weisberg, through her vast social network—she was unstoppably energetic and extraordinarily extroverted—“make[s] the world work.” Weisberg knew almost everybody, and almost everybody else knew somebody who knew her. People like Weisberg, Gladwell argued, are the unknown hubs around which the rest of us spin: because they know so many different kinds of people, “they spread ideas and information. They connect varied and isolated parts of society.”]]>Lois Weisberg died yesterday, at the age of ninety. According to the Chicago Reader, Weisberg, who worked for decades as the head of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs, was “the former linchpin of nearly everything that’s cultural about Chicago.” She was also one of Malcolm Gladwell’s most memorable Profile subjects. In 1999, Gladwell wrote a piece about her called “Six Degrees of Lois Weisberg,” in which he argued that Weisberg, through her vast social network—she was unstoppably energetic and extraordinarily extroverted—“make[s] the world work.” Weisberg knew almost everybody, and almost everybody else knew somebody who knew her. People like Weisberg, Gladwell argued, are the unknown hubs around which the rest of us spin: because they know so many different kinds of people, “they spread ideas and information. They connect varied and isolated parts of society.”

Related:William Trevor in The New YorkerPostscript: Thom JonesPostscript: Abbas Kiarostami, 1940—2016]]>Listen to Carla Morrisonhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/listen-to-carla-morrison?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3145079 Joshua RothmanThu, 10 Dec 2015 14:00:08 +0000Carla Morrison is a twenty-nine-year-old singer-songwriter who lives in Mexico City. She sings in Spanish, and so isn’t well-known in the United States. In Mexico, though, she’s a star, with two Latin Grammys and a gold-certified album, “Déjenme Llorar” (“Let Me Cry”). She fills festival tents with her lilting, acoustic songs about love gone wrong. “Let me cry alone, I want to get this off my chest,” she sings, during the chorus of “Déjenme Llorar.” There’s humility to her heartbreak—a lightness to her sadness that makes it magnetic.]]>Carla Morrison is a twenty-nine-year-old singer-songwriter who lives in Mexico City. She sings in Spanish, and so isn’t well-known in the United States. In Mexico, though, she’s a star, with two Latin Grammys and a gold-certified album, “Déjenme Llorar” (“Let Me Cry”). She fills festival tents with her lilting, acoustic songs about love gone wrong. “Let me cry alone, I want to get this off my chest,” she sings, during the chorus of “Déjenme Llorar.” There’s humility to her heartbreak—a lightness to her sadness that makes it magnetic.

]]>Remembering Janet Wolfehttp://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/remembering-janet-wolfe?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3144840 Erin Overbey and Joshua RothmanTue, 08 Dec 2015 20:30:23 +0000Janet Wolfe was a presence in The New Yorker for almost twenty-five years. From 1969 to 1992, she appeared in nearly thirty stories in The Talk of the Town. In the stories, which were written by Susan Lardner, Janet was identified only as “our friend Janet”; she offered updates on her life that were, by turns, hilarious, surprising, moving, alarming, and awe-inspiring. In a sense, she embodied The Talk of the Town. She knew everyone, had a thought about everything, and possessed the kind of roving, inquisitive, eccentric, self-assured mind to which New Yorkers aspire.]]>Janet Wolfe was a presence in The New Yorker for almost twenty-five years. From 1969 to 1992, she appeared in nearly thirty stories in The Talk of the Town. In the stories, which were written by Susan Lardner, Janet was identified only as “our friend Janet”; she offered updates on her life that were, by turns, hilarious, surprising, moving, alarming, and awe-inspiring. In a sense, she embodied The Talk of the Town. She knew everyone, had a thought about everything, and possessed the kind of roving, inquisitive, eccentric, self-assured mind to which New Yorkers aspire.

Related:The Intoxicating Promise of New York City’s Night-Life FlyersThe New York City Walking Tour of Los AngelesWhen Cars Ruled the Night: New York City, 1974-1976]]>After the San Bernardino Shooting, Three Approaches to Gun Violencehttp://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/after-the-san-bernardino-shooting-three-approaches-to-gun-violence?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3142873 Joshua RothmanWed, 02 Dec 2015 21:52:50 +0000A short while ago, news came of yet another mass shooting—this one in San Bernardino, California, at an office complex called the Inland Regional Center. The shooting may have claimed as many as twenty victims, and is the latest in a string of terrible incidents, including a shooting, just last week, at a Planned Parenthood health center in Colorado Springs. Why does mass gun violence seem to be on the rise—and what can be done to stop it?]]>A short while ago, news came of yet another mass shooting—this one in San Bernardino, California, at an office complex called the Inland Regional Center. The shooting may have claimed as many as twenty victims, and is the latest in a string of terrible incidents, including a shooting, just last week, at a Planned Parenthood health center in Colorado Springs. Why does mass gun violence seem to be on the rise—and what can be done to stop it?

Related:A Hitchcockian Re-Creation of the First Modern Mass ShootingThe Haunting Normalcy of Mass ShootingsAfter Dallas, The Future of Black Lives Matter]]>Names in the Ivy Leaguehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/names-in-the-ivy-league?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3141160 Joshua RothmanThu, 26 Nov 2015 05:00:04 +0000The Foro Italico is a large sports complex in Rome that was built between 1928 and 1938 at the behest of Benito Mussolini. Originally, it was called the Foro Mussolini, and, at its entrance, a towering obelisk bears the inscription “MUSSOLINI DUX.” Nearby, a stone timeline commemorates great moments in Fascist history. Statues of nude, muscled male athletes line the track; the central piazza features a vast mosaic celebrating various Fascist triumphs, including Italy’s 1936 invasion of Ethiopia. (It depicts, among other scenes, an Ethiopian man performing the Fascist salute.) After the Second World War, Italians attended sporting events in the Foro and tried to overlook its Fascist elements. But then, in 1955, Rome won the competition to host the 1960 Olympics. The Foro became an urgent political problem. What was to be done with the inscriptions, statues, and mosaics, some of which had fallen into disrepair, and all of which were soon to appear on the world stage?]]>The Foro Italico is a large sports complex in Rome that was built between 1928 and 1938 at the behest of Benito Mussolini. Originally, it was called the Foro Mussolini, and, at its entrance, a towering obelisk bears the inscription “MUSSOLINI DUX.” Nearby, a stone timeline commemorates great moments in Fascist history. Statues of nude, muscled male athletes line the track; the central piazza features a vast mosaic celebrating various Fascist triumphs, including Italy’s 1936 invasion of Ethiopia. (It depicts, among other scenes, an Ethiopian man performing the Fascist salute.) After the Second World War, Italians attended sporting events in the Foro and tried to overlook its Fascist elements. But then, in 1955, Rome won the competition to host the 1960 Olympics. The Foro became an urgent political problem. What was to be done with the inscriptions, statues, and mosaics, some of which had fallen into disrepair, and all of which were soon to appear on the world stage?

Related:The Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasMaryann Plunkett Is a Radiant EverywomanItaly Approaches Its Own Choice Between Liberalism and Populism]]>It’s Raining Menswearhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/its-raining-menswear?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3134871 Joshua RothmanThu, 12 Nov 2015 20:30:46 +0000Earlier this fall, Antonio Banderas, a.k.a. Zorro, began taking classes in menswear design at Central Saint Martins, the renowned London fashion school. In an interview with the school’s student-run Web site and magazine, Banderas explained that he wanted to start his own menswear line; his particular ambition was to bring back the cape. Capes for men, he said, have “incredible possibilities”:]]>Earlier this fall, Antonio Banderas, a.k.a. Zorro, began taking classes in menswear design at Central Saint Martins, the renowned London fashion school. In an interview with the school’s student-run Web site and magazine, Banderas explained that he wanted to start his own menswear line; his particular ambition was to bring back the cape. Capes for men, he said, have “incredible possibilities”:

Related:A Fashion Line Inspired by the New York City Sanitation DepartmentA Portrait of the Creative Mind Behind Gucci, on InstagramCover Story: “In the Shade,” by Malika Favre]]>The Screening Room: “Review”http://www.newyorker.com/books/joshua-rothman/the-screening-room-review?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3125114 Joshua RothmanWed, 21 Oct 2015 18:20:16 +0000For a while, the filmmaker Dustin Guy Defa worked in a video store. To pass the time, he and his co-workers invented a game. Each person would describe a movie to the others, packing in as much vivid detail as possible, while keeping the identity of the movie a secret for the other players to guess. The best storytellers could reveal a lot while keeping their audience in the dark as to the movie’s name.]]>For a while, the filmmaker Dustin Guy Defa worked in a video store. To pass the time, he and his co-workers invented a game. Each person would describe a movie to the others, packing in as much vivid detail as possible, while keeping the identity of the movie a secret for the other players to guess. The best storytellers could reveal a lot while keeping their audience in the dark as to the movie’s name.

Related:Breitbart Treats Kellogg to Its Smash-Mouth StyleHistory’s Great Authors Request NudesObama Signs Executive Order Requiring President of United States to Be Taxpayer]]>Was Steve Jobs an Artist?http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/was-steve-jobs-an-artist?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3121618 Joshua RothmanWed, 14 Oct 2015 22:28:16 +0000There are a lot of great arguments in the new film “Steve Jobs,” but one stands above the rest. Jobs and Woz—Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple—are in the garage, disagreeing about the design of the Apple II. Jobs thinks that the computer should be sealed up and impossible to modify; Woz thinks it should be open and expandable, so that hobbyists can tinker with it. Jobs says that a computer should be perfect, like a work of art. Woz says that’s ridiculous. Jobs tells Woz, “Every time you say, ‘A computer is not a painting,’ I’m going to say, ‘Fuck you.’ ” Then, we flash forward more than a decade, to 1988. Jobs and Woz are backstage, and Jobs is about to unveil the first computer from his new company, NeXT. The computer is a beautiful cube that’s impractical, expensive, and doomed to fail. “A computer is not a painting,” Woz intones. “Fuck you!” Jobs replies.]]>There are a lot of great arguments in the new film “Steve Jobs,” but one stands above the rest. Jobs and Woz—Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple—are in the garage, disagreeing about the design of the Apple II. Jobs thinks that the computer should be sealed up and impossible to modify; Woz thinks it should be open and expandable, so that hobbyists can tinker with it. Jobs says that a computer should be perfect, like a work of art. Woz says that’s ridiculous. Jobs tells Woz, “Every time you say, ‘A computer is not a painting,’ I’m going to say, ‘Fuck you.’ ” Then, we flash forward more than a decade, to 1988. Jobs and Woz are backstage, and Jobs is about to unveil the first computer from his new company, NeXT. The computer is a beautiful cube that’s impractical, expensive, and doomed to fail. “A computer is not a painting,” Woz intones. “Fuck you!” Jobs replies.

Related:The Fate of Cinephilia in the Age of StreamingFour Cool Laptop Cords for Writers to Wear Safely to BedTrump Preparedness: Digital Security 101]]>The Question at the Heart of “The Good Wife”http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-question-at-the-heart-of-the-good-wife?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3118799 Joshua RothmanFri, 09 Oct 2015 16:07:14 +0000This past Sunday, I interviewed Julianna Margulies, of “The Good Wife,” at The New Yorker Festival. At one point, I asked about a rumor that has fascinated fans of her show—the rumor that the fictional acrimony between two of its characters, Alicia Florrick and Kalinda Sharma, is mirrored by a real-life feud between the actresses who play them, Margulies and Archie Panjabi. Margulies was game to answer my question (“It’s silly gossip,” she said), but, beforehand, across the table, she fixed me with a look that fans of the show would have recognized: the expression of appalled and disappointed skepticism with which Alicia so often faces her opponents in court. It was scary, but also great. This is it, I thought—the closest I’ll ever come to being on “The Good Wife.”]]>This past Sunday, I interviewed Julianna Margulies, of “The Good Wife,” at The New Yorker Festival. At one point, I asked about a rumor that has fascinated fans of her show—the rumor that the fictional acrimony between two of its characters, Alicia Florrick and Kalinda Sharma, is mirrored by a real-life feud between the actresses who play them, Margulies and Archie Panjabi. Margulies was game to answer my question (“It’s silly gossip,” she said), but, beforehand, across the table, she fixed me with a look that fans of the show would have recognized: the expression of appalled and disappointed skepticism with which Alicia so often faces her opponents in court. It was scary, but also great. This is it, I thought—the closest I’ll ever come to being on “The Good Wife.”

Related:“Westworld,” Episode 9: Brother, Can You Spare a Time Line?Why Blind Americans Are Worried About Trump’s Tech PolicyTrump TV Late-Night Packet]]>The Unsettling Arrival of Speculative 9/11 Fictionhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-creepy-power-of-speculative-911-fiction?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3104130 Joshua RothmanFri, 11 Sep 2015 11:53:39 +0000When I was in high school, my English class read a famous short story called “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” written in 1890 by Ambrose Bierce. Its central character, Peyton Farquhar, is a slave-owning Southern planter. As the story opens, Peyton is about to be hanged by the Union Army for attempted sabotage. Soldiers tie a noose around his neck and throw him into a river. But the rope snaps, and Peyton swims to shore, ducks into the woods, and goes home to his wife. When he sees her, he feels joy but also a stabbing pain. It turns out that he’s only been imagining his escape—actually, his body has been falling from the bridge the whole time. At the end of the story, his neck breaks and he dies.]]>When I was in high school, my English class read a famous short story called “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” written in 1890 by Ambrose Bierce. Its central character, Peyton Farquhar, is a slave-owning Southern planter. As the story opens, Peyton is about to be hanged by the Union Army for attempted sabotage. Soldiers tie a noose around his neck and throw him into a river. But the rope snaps, and Peyton swims to shore, ducks into the woods, and goes home to his wife. When he sees her, he feels joy but also a stabbing pain. It turns out that he’s only been imagining his escape—actually, his body has been falling from the bridge the whole time. At the end of the story, his neck breaks and he dies.

Related:The Feminist Legacy of “The Baby-Sitters Club”The Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasFarewell, BookCourt: You Showed What a Bookstore Can Do]]>Oliver Sacks in The New Yorkerhttp://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/oliver-sacks-in-the-new-yorker?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3098226 Joshua RothmanSun, 30 Aug 2015 14:00:56 +0000Oliver Sacks, the neurologist and writer, died on Sunday at the age of eighty-two. He was a treasured writer here at The New Yorker. Sacks wrote his first piece for the magazine, “A Surgeon’s Life,” in 1992; it was a profile of a doctor with Tourette’s syndrome. From then on, often under the rubric “A Neurologist’s Notebook,” Sacks explored both the extraordinary ways in which the brain and mind can change and the courage of the individuals who adapt to those changes. His writing testified to human frailty and human strength.]]>Oliver Sacks, the neurologist and writer, died on Sunday at the age of eighty-two. He was a treasured writer here at The New Yorker. Sacks wrote his first piece for the magazine, “A Surgeon’s Life,” in 1992; it was a profile of a doctor with Tourette’s syndrome. From then on, often under the rubric “A Neurologist’s Notebook,” Sacks explored both the extraordinary ways in which the brain and mind can change and the courage of the individuals who adapt to those changes. His writing testified to human frailty and human strength.

Related:A Year Without Oliver SacksSwimming with Oliver SacksA New Map of the Arctic?]]>Hurricane Katrina in The New Yorkerhttp://www.newyorker.com/books/double-take/hurricane-katrina-in-the-new-yorker?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3097502 Joshua RothmanFri, 28 Aug 2015 16:00:17 +0000Ten years ago tomorrow, on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans. In the issue of The New Yorker that appeared right after the storm, Nicholas Lemann, who was born and raised in New Orleans, wrote:]]>Ten years ago tomorrow, on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans. In the issue of The New Yorker that appeared right after the storm, Nicholas Lemann, who was born and raised in New Orleans, wrote:

Related:The Long, Vital History of Bystander RecordingsA New Orleans Photographer’s Eye for Male Beauty and ImperfectionRacism, Stress, and Black Death]]>T. S. Eliot Would Have Liked Beach Househttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/t-s-eliot-would-have-liked-beach-house?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3096974 Joshua RothmanFri, 28 Aug 2015 14:00:33 +0000In 1990, the Anglo-Irish band My Bloody Valentine recorded a song called “Soon.” It had just four components: a simple, jittering drum loop; a cheeky keyboard pattern; gliding, indistinct vocals; and a towering wall of guitar noise, which, like a sculpture by Richard Serra, seemed dense enough to bend under its own weight. Played loud, it was beautiful, scary, and infinitely textured—a wave powered by a jet engine. The song became a minor hit and a critical sensation; during a talk at MOMA, Brian Eno praised it as “the vaguest piece of music ever to become a hit” and said that it “set a new standard” in rock and roll. What made it unique was its combination of power and vagueness. Listening to it was like being crushed by a cloud.]]>In 1990, the Anglo-Irish band My Bloody Valentine recorded a song called “Soon.” It had just four components: a simple, jittering drum loop; a cheeky keyboard pattern; gliding, indistinct vocals; and a towering wall of guitar noise, which, like a sculpture by Richard Serra, seemed dense enough to bend under its own weight. Played loud, it was beautiful, scary, and infinitely textured—a wave powered by a jet engine. The song became a minor hit and a critical sensation; during a talk at MOMA, Brian Eno praised it as “the vaguest piece of music ever to become a hit” and said that it “set a new standard” in rock and roll. What made it unique was its combination of power and vagueness. Listening to it was like being crushed by a cloud.

Related:The Vinyl Countdown]]>Seeing and Hearing for the First Time, on YouTubehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/seeing-and-hearing-for-the-first-time-on-youtube?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3092822 Joshua RothmanTue, 18 Aug 2015 14:42:31 +0000Ethan Scott, a twenty-four-year-old actor from Los Angeles, has been color-blind his whole life. He has trouble seeing green and purple. Earlier this summer, he received a high-tech pair of glasses for his birthday. The glasses are manufactured by a company called EnChroma, and they use carefully filtered light to help color-blind people see more of the spectrum.]]>Ethan Scott, a twenty-four-year-old actor from Los Angeles, has been color-blind his whole life. He has trouble seeing green and purple. Earlier this summer, he received a high-tech pair of glasses for his birthday. The glasses are manufactured by a company called EnChroma, and they use carefully filtered light to help color-blind people see more of the spectrum.

Related:Japan’s Pivot from Obama to TrumpIn “Allied,” Empty Nostalgia for American HeroesJohn Hersey, the Writer Who Let “Hiroshima” Speak for Itself]]>U2: Bring Back the Ironyhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/u2-bring-back-the-irony?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3085302 Joshua RothmanFri, 31 Jul 2015 19:00:14 +0000When U2 got together, in September, 1976, Bono, Adam Clayton, and the Edge were sixteen, and Larry Mullen, Jr., was fourteen. At first, they called themselves the Larry Mullen Band, then Feedback, then the Hype. They changed the band’s name to U2 the following year while playing at a community center in Howth, a gorgeous little seaside town near Dublin. When U2 released its first album, “Boy,” in 1980, half of its members were still teen-agers. Which is all to say that a lot has changed since then. The men are now in their fifties, and their band is almost forty years old. More than seven million people bought tickets to U2’s last tour, which began in 2009, ended in 2011, and involved a hundred-and-sixty-foot tall stage called “The Claw.” (It remains the highest grossing tour of all time.) During those shows, a recorded message from Desmond Tutu introduced the song “One.” Last week, during one of the band’s new, smaller-scale shows at Madison Square Garden, Stephen Hawking provided the intro to “City of Blinding Lights” while, on U2’s giant video screen, the Earth spun: the ultimate community center.]]>When U2 got together, in September, 1976, Bono, Adam Clayton, and the Edge were sixteen, and Larry Mullen, Jr., was fourteen. At first, they called themselves the Larry Mullen Band, then Feedback, then the Hype. They changed the band’s name to U2 the following year while playing at a community center in Howth, a gorgeous little seaside town near Dublin. When U2 released its first album, “Boy,” in 1980, half of its members were still teen-agers. Which is all to say that a lot has changed since then. The men are now in their fifties, and their band is almost forty years old. More than seven million people bought tickets to U2’s last tour, which began in 2009, ended in 2011, and involved a hundred-and-sixty-foot tall stage called “The Claw.” (It remains the highest grossing tour of all time.) During those shows, a recorded message from Desmond Tutu introduced the song “One.” Last week, during one of the band’s new, smaller-scale shows at Madison Square Garden, Stephen Hawking provided the intro to “City of Blinding Lights” while, on U2’s giant video screen, the Earth spun: the ultimate community center.

Related:Listening as Activism: The “Sonic Meditations” of Pauline OliverosRobbie Robertson Offers His Story of the BandSwooning to the Strangeness of Bon Iver]]>New York City Skateboarders, on Tintypehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/photo-booth/new-york-city-skateboarders-on-tintype?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3084487 Joshua RothmanThu, 30 Jul 2015 17:00:54 +0000In 2007, midway through her training as an art conservator, Melissa Cacciola found herself learning about tintype portraits. A nineteenth-century photographic process, popular especially during the Civil War, tintypes form on metal plates that have been treated with silver nitrate, ether, collodion, cyanide, and other chemicals. In recent years, Cacciola has made tintype portraits of soldiers, steelworkers, and brass-band musicians. Her new series, “Flip It and Reverse It,” focusses on New York City skateboarders.]]>In 2007, midway through her training as an art conservator, Melissa Cacciola found herself learning about tintype portraits. A nineteenth-century photographic process, popular especially during the Civil War, tintypes form on metal plates that have been treated with silver nitrate, ether, collodion, cyanide, and other chemicals. In recent years, Cacciola has made tintype portraits of soldiers, steelworkers, and brass-band musicians. Her new series, “Flip It and Reverse It,” focusses on New York City skateboarders.

Related:“I’m Very Much in Love with Where I’m From”: William Christenberry’s American SouthA Festival Full of Exploding SledgehammersLooking at How Abortion Restrictions Endanger Women’s Lives]]>The City So Nice They Walked It Twicehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-city-so-nice-they-walked-it-twice?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3083060 Joshua RothmanWed, 29 Jul 2015 11:00:34 +0000A few years ago, William Helmreich, a sociology professor at CUNY, wrote a book called “The New York Nobody Knows.” Helmreich had spent four years walking every block in the five boroughs—that’s a hundred and twenty thousand blocks and six thousand miles. He had produced a street-level biography of the whole city. I read it and found it fascinating. Eventually, I met Helmreich, and we walked around the Bronx together. Three things were immediately clear: he loved New York, he loved people, and the people of New York loved him. On Charlotte Street, in the South Bronx, a man strolled up and said, “Hey, I saw you here two years ago!” They talked for twenty minutes, like old friends; when, in the middle of their conversation, the man had to run a brief errand, he asked Helmreich to babysit his young daughter.]]>A few years ago, William Helmreich, a sociology professor at CUNY, wrote a book called “The New York Nobody Knows.” Helmreich had spent four years walking every block in the five boroughs—that’s a hundred and twenty thousand blocks and six thousand miles. He had produced a street-level biography of the whole city. I read it and found it fascinating. Eventually, I met Helmreich, and we walked around the Bronx together. Three things were immediately clear: he loved New York, he loved people, and the people of New York loved him. On Charlotte Street, in the South Bronx, a man strolled up and said, “Hey, I saw you here two years ago!” They talked for twenty minutes, like old friends; when, in the middle of their conversation, the man had to run a brief errand, he asked Helmreich to babysit his young daughter.

Related:The Intoxicating Promise of New York City’s Night-Life FlyersThe New York City Walking Tour of Los AngelesWhen Cars Ruled the Night: New York City, 1974-1976]]>Ingrid Sischy in The New Yorkerhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/ingrid-sischy-in-the-new-yorker?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3082198 Joshua RothmanSat, 25 Jul 2015 18:50:29 +0000Ingrid Sischy, the writer, editor, and art critic, died on Friday, at the age of sixty-three. Sischy wrote about art and fashion for The New Yorker from 1988 to 1996; she later became the editor-in-chief of Interview magazine and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. To readers of this magazine, she was also familiar as the subject of “A Girl of the Zeitgeist,” a 1986 Profile by Janet Malcolm. Sischy was named the editor-in-chief of Artforum when she was just twenty-seven; Malcolm, in a two-part Profile, wrote about the transition she embodied. At Artforum, Sischy ushered in a new and expansive set of attitudes about art—simultaneously rigorous and ironic, heartfelt and self-aware, sincere and playful. Malcolm described her this way:]]>Ingrid Sischy, the writer, editor, and art critic, died on Friday, at the age of sixty-three. Sischy wrote about art and fashion for The New Yorker from 1988 to 1996; she later became the editor-in-chief of Interview magazine and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. To readers of this magazine, she was also familiar as the subject of “A Girl of the Zeitgeist,” a 1986 Profile by Janet Malcolm. Sischy was named the editor-in-chief of Artforum when she was just twenty-seven; Malcolm, in a two-part Profile, wrote about the transition she embodied. At Artforum, Sischy ushered in a new and expansive set of attitudes about art—simultaneously rigorous and ironic, heartfelt and self-aware, sincere and playful. Malcolm described her this way:

Related:William Trevor in The New YorkerPostscript: Thom JonesA Fashion Line Inspired by the New York City Sanitation Department]]>Sympathetic Sci-Fihttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/sympathetic-sci-fi?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3075719 Joshua RothmanTue, 14 Jul 2015 14:00:08 +0000The defining scene of “Sense8,” the new sci-fi drama on Netflix, comes about halfway through the first season. It starts in San Francisco, where Nomi, a “hacktivist” and transgender lesbian, is making out with her girlfriend, Amanita. At the same time, in Mexico City, Lito, a smoldering actor, is lifting weights with his boyfriend, Hernando. In Berlin, Wolfgang, a safecracker, is relaxing, naked, in a hot tub. And in Chicago, Will, a police officer, is working out at the gym. The premise of “Sense8” is that Nomi, Lito, Wolfgang, and Will—along with four other “sensates” in Nairobi, Seoul, Mumbai, and Reykjavik—are telepathically linked. They are able to feel each other’s emotions, appear in each other’s minds, and even control each other’s bodies. In this instance, because they’re all feeling sexy, the sensates find themselves having an impromptu telepathic orgy. They’re a little freaked out until they realize that they can all enjoy Wolfgang’s hot tub simultaneously.]]>The defining scene of “Sense8,” the new sci-fi drama on Netflix, comes about halfway through the first season. It starts in San Francisco, where Nomi, a “hacktivist” and transgender lesbian, is making out with her girlfriend, Amanita. At the same time, in Mexico City, Lito, a smoldering actor, is lifting weights with his boyfriend, Hernando. In Berlin, Wolfgang, a safecracker, is relaxing, naked, in a hot tub. And in Chicago, Will, a police officer, is working out at the gym. The premise of “Sense8” is that Nomi, Lito, Wolfgang, and Will—along with four other “sensates” in Nairobi, Seoul, Mumbai, and Reykjavik—are telepathically linked. They are able to feel each other’s emotions, appear in each other’s minds, and even control each other’s bodies. In this instance, because they’re all feeling sexy, the sensates find themselves having an impromptu telepathic orgy. They’re a little freaked out until they realize that they can all enjoy Wolfgang’s hot tub simultaneously.

Related:“Westworld,” Episode 9: Brother, Can You Spare a Time Line?Why Blind Americans Are Worried About Trump’s Tech PolicyTrump TV Late-Night Packet]]>Take the Ghost Trainhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/take-the-ghost-train?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3069850 Joshua RothmanTue, 30 Jun 2015 15:44:39 +0000The plot of “Ghost Train,” the newest film in our Screening Room series, could’ve been written by Stephen King. The film centers on Geoff, an elderly man who has just placed Carolyn, his wife, in a nursing home. Carolyn has dementia, and Geoff is lonely and adrift. Then, one day, he notices a bar near his house called Dracula’s. When Geoff walks inside, he’s greeted by vampires. They take him to the Ghost Train, which tootles its way along a haunted track. At the end of the line, he finds a cabaret. Onstage, there’s a dancer—a beautiful young woman named Gillian who is wearing a bustier and little horns. She sings a song called “Jar of Hearts.” (“Who do you think you are, / Running round, leaving scars, / Collecting your jar of hearts?”) Geoff is captivated. He finds himself falling in love with this personification of passion, vitality, sex, and death.]]>The plot of “Ghost Train,” the newest film in our Screening Room series, could’ve been written by Stephen King. The film centers on Geoff, an elderly man who has just placed Carolyn, his wife, in a nursing home. Carolyn has dementia, and Geoff is lonely and adrift. Then, one day, he notices a bar near his house called Dracula’s. When Geoff walks inside, he’s greeted by vampires. They take him to the Ghost Train, which tootles its way along a haunted track. At the end of the line, he finds a cabaret. Onstage, there’s a dancer—a beautiful young woman named Gillian who is wearing a bustier and little horns. She sings a song called “Jar of Hearts.” (“Who do you think you are, / Running round, leaving scars, / Collecting your jar of hearts?”) Geoff is captivated. He finds himself falling in love with this personification of passion, vitality, sex, and death.

Related:“Whatever Happened to Interracial Love?”: Kathleen Collins’s Revelatory Short StoriesA Self-Bundling Service for CinephilesA Portrait of My Ego as a Big Black Dog]]>A New Hymn for Charlestonhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/a-new-hymn-for-charleston?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3068863 Joshua RothmanWed, 24 Jun 2015 18:05:51 +0000Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, a fifty-four-year-old pastor from Wilmington, Delaware, is a prolific and celebrated composer of hymns. She’s written around two hundred and fifty of them, and they’ve been published in two collections, “Songs of Grace” and “Gifts of Love.” Many of her hymns respond to current events. After Columbine, she wrote a hymn called “God, We Have Heard It.” (“God, we have heard it, sounding in the silence: / News of the children lost to this world’s violence.”) She wrote “O God, Our Words Cannot Express,” which was sung at memorial services large and small. A series of her hymns celebrates the women of the Bible; others oppose gun culture; many are about racism. When George Zimmerman was acquitted of the murder of Trayvon Martin, she wrote a hymn called “We Pray for Youth We Dearly Love.” Often, her hymns are posted to the Internet within a few days of the events to which they respond, and congregations begin singing them immediately. Her husband, Bruce, with whom she is the co-pastor of Limestone Presbyterian Church, in Wilmington, estimates that her hymns have been performed in eighteen hundred churches around the world.]]>Carolyn Winfrey Gillette, a fifty-four-year-old pastor from Wilmington, Delaware, is a prolific and celebrated composer of hymns. She’s written around two hundred and fifty of them, and they’ve been published in two collections, “Songs of Grace” and “Gifts of Love.” Many of her hymns respond to current events. After Columbine, she wrote a hymn called “God, We Have Heard It.” (“God, we have heard it, sounding in the silence: / News of the children lost to this world’s violence.”) She wrote “O God, Our Words Cannot Express,” which was sung at memorial services large and small. A series of her hymns celebrates the women of the Bible; others oppose gun culture; many are about racism. When George Zimmerman was acquitted of the murder of Trayvon Martin, she wrote a hymn called “We Pray for Youth We Dearly Love.” Often, her hymns are posted to the Internet within a few days of the events to which they respond, and congregations begin singing them immediately. Her husband, Bruce, with whom she is the co-pastor of Limestone Presbyterian Church, in Wilmington, estimates that her hymns have been performed in eighteen hundred churches around the world.

Related:The Hate That Remains, a Year After CharlestonThere Is No Justice In Killing Dylann RoofBarack Obama’s Second Inaugural in Charleston]]>A New Theory of Distractionhttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/a-new-theory-of-distraction?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3064110 Joshua RothmanTue, 16 Jun 2015 14:01:51 +0000“At painful times, when composition is impossible and reading is not enough, grammars and dictionaries are excellent for distraction,” the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote, in 1839. Those were the days. Browning is still right, of course: ask any reader of Wikipedia or Urban Dictionary. She sounds anachronistic only because no modern person needs advice about how to be distracted. Like typing, Googling, and driving, distraction is now a universal competency. We’re all experts.]]>“At painful times, when composition is impossible and reading is not enough, grammars and dictionaries are excellent for distraction,” the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote, in 1839. Those were the days. Browning is still right, of course: ask any reader of Wikipedia or Urban Dictionary. She sounds anachronistic only because no modern person needs advice about how to be distracted. Like typing, Googling, and driving, distraction is now a universal competency. We’re all experts.

Related:The Feminist Legacy of “The Baby-Sitters Club”The Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasThe Fate of Cinephilia in the Age of Streaming]]>Takes: Jonathan Franzen’s Profile of Dennis Hasterthttp://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/takes-jonathan-franzens-profile-of-dennis-hastert?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3057283 Joshua RothmanFri, 29 May 2015 16:56:21 +0000Yesterday, federal prosecutors indicted Dennis Hastert, the Republican congressman from Illinois who was Speaker of the House from 1999 to 2007, charging him with lying to the F.B.I and evading bank regulations, in an attempt to hide payments to an undisclosed person for “prior misconduct.” In 2003, Jonathan Franzen wrote a Profile of Hastert, called “The Listener,” for this magazine. Here’s how Franzen described the Speaker:]]>Yesterday, federal prosecutors indicted Dennis Hastert, the Republican congressman from Illinois who was Speaker of the House from 1999 to 2007, charging him with lying to the F.B.I and evading bank regulations, in an attempt to hide payments to an undisclosed person for “prior misconduct.” In 2003, Jonathan Franzen wrote a Profile of Hastert, called “The Listener,” for this magazine. Here’s how Franzen described the Speaker:

Related:Trump’s Conflict-of-Interest ProblemDonald Trump’s Great Bait and SwitchDonald Trump Enters Mitch McConnell’s Washington]]>“The Good Wife” and the Good Lifehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-good-wife-and-the-good-life?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3048449 Joshua RothmanMon, 11 May 2015 21:43:48 +0000For years, “The Good Wife” was easy to love. Smart, sexy lawyers (and investigators) drifted together and apart, like dancers at a ball, while Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) grew in competence, independence, elegance, and power. Every scene was suffused with wit and intelligence; every character, no matter how craven, commanded your respect. It was, essentially, a humanist show—a drama about acuity, vitality, and resilience in the face of indifference, which was represented by the law.

]]>

For years, “The Good Wife” was easy to love. Smart, sexy lawyers (and investigators) drifted together and apart, like dancers at a ball, while Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) grew in competence, independence, elegance, and power. Every scene was suffused with wit and intelligence; every character, no matter how craven, commanded your respect. It was, essentially, a humanist show—a drama about acuity, vitality, and resilience in the face of indifference, which was represented by the law.

Related:“Westworld,” Episode 9: Brother, Can You Spare a Time Line?Why Blind Americans Are Worried About Trump’s Tech PolicyTrump TV Late-Night Packet]]>Anatomy of Errorhttp://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/05/18/anatomy-of-error?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3045566 Joshua RothmanMon, 11 May 2015 04:00:00 +0000BooksFor the schoolteacher, the changes had come slowly. First, his walking had grown unsteady; then his hearing had worsened. He had become stooped, and had begun walking with a cane, even though he was only in his late fifties. Now he sat with his wife and son in the consulting room of Henry Marsh, a London neurosurgeon, looking at a scan of his brain, which showed a tumor growing near the base of his skull. The question was whether it could, or should, be removed. Marsh, who had been practicing neurosurgery for only a few years, was unsure. The tumor was massive—he was startled by its size—and it was situated in the brain stem, a vital area. Left to itself, it would destroy the schoolteacher’s hearing, rob him of his ability to walk, and, eventually, kill him. But, Marsh explained, surgery could leave him paralyzed, or worse. The family faced a difficult choice, between the certainty of a slow, predictable decline and the possibility of an immediate cure—or catastrophe.]]>For the schoolteacher, the changes had come slowly. First, his walking had grown unsteady; then his hearing had worsened. He had become stooped, and had begun walking with a cane, even though he was only in his late fifties. Now he sat with his wife and son in the consulting room of Henry Marsh, a London neurosurgeon, looking at a scan of his brain, which showed a tumor growing near the base of his skull. The question was whether it could, or should, be removed. Marsh, who had been practicing neurosurgery for only a few years, was unsure. The tumor was massive—he was startled by its size—and it was situated in the brain stem, a vital area. Left to itself, it would destroy the schoolteacher’s hearing, rob him of his ability to walk, and, eventually, kill him. But, Marsh explained, surgery could leave him paralyzed, or worse. The family faced a difficult choice, between the certainty of a slow, predictable decline and the possibility of an immediate cure—or catastrophe.

Related:The Feminist Legacy of “The Baby-Sitters Club”The Worldly Digressions of Javier MaríasFarewell, BookCourt: You Showed What a Bookstore Can Do]]>The Bizarre, Complicated Formula for Literary Famehttp://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-bizarre-complicated-formula-for-literary-fame?mbid=rss
http://www.newyorker.com/?p=3031605 Joshua RothmanFri, 17 Apr 2015 18:42:39 +0000William Wordsworth died a hundred and sixty-five years ago next week, on April 23, 1850. Why is he still so famous? The obvious answer is that he was a genius. But genius isn’t, in itself, enough to guarantee the sort of lasting, exalted fame that Wordsworth enjoys. Every year, about seventy thousand people visit his home, Dove Cottage, which is maintained by an organization called the Wordsworth Trust. John Dryden was a genius, too—of his role in English poetry, Samuel Johnson said, “He found it brick, and he left it marble”—but all a Dryden fan can do is visit the John Dryden House, a municipal building named in his honor, housing offices belonging to the Northamptonshire County Council. Only graduate students read Dryden. Of his fame, we might say that history found it marble, and left it brick.

]]>

William Wordsworth died a hundred and sixty-five years ago next week, on April 23, 1850. Why is he still so famous? The obvious answer is that he was a genius. But genius isn’t, in itself, enough to guarantee the sort of lasting, exalted fame that Wordsworth enjoys. Every year, about seventy thousand people visit his home, Dove Cottage, which is maintained by an organization called the Wordsworth Trust. John Dryden was a genius, too—of his role in English poetry, Samuel Johnson said, “He found it brick, and he left it marble”—but all a Dryden fan can do is visit the John Dryden House, a municipal building named in his honor, housing offices belonging to the Northamptonshire County Council. Only graduate students read Dryden. Of his fame, we might say that history found it marble, and left it brick.